You ask whether certain information is subject to required public disclosure
under the Texas Open Records Act, chapter 552 of the Government Code. Your
requests were assigned ID# 121494 and ID# 121619.

The Harris County Flood Control District (the "county") received two
open records request for eight categories of information from each requestor
concerning White Oak Bayou. You do not contend that the requested
information comes within any of the exceptions to disclosure listed in subchapter C
of the Open Records Act. You contend, however, that the requested HEC-1 and
HEC-2 models for certain county units, "HEC-1 and HEC-2 models for White Oak
Bayou," and "1' topographic information adjacent to White Oak Bayou" are not
subject to disclosure pursuant to section 552.027 of the Government Code because
they are "commercially available" elsewhere for a fee. Because you do not object to
the release of the remaining requested items, you must release those items.

Section 552.027 of the Government Code provides:

(a) A governmental body is not required under this
chapter to allow the inspection of or to provide a copy of
information in a commercial book or publication purchased or
acquired by the governmental body for research purposes if the
book or publication is commercially available to the public.

(b) Although information in a book or publication may
be made available to the public as a resource material, such as
a library book, a governmental body is not required to make a
copy of the information in response to a request for public
information.

(c) A governmental body shall allow the inspection of
information in a book or publication that is made part of,
incorporated into, or referred to in a rule or policy of a
governmental body. [Emphasis added.]

This section is designed to alleviate the burden of providing copies of
commercially available books, publications, and resource materials maintained
by governmental bodies, such as telephone directories, dictionaries, encyclopedias,
statutes, and periodicals. The legislative history of this provision notes that
section 552.002 should exclude from the definition of public information

books and other materials that are also available as research
tools elsewhere to any member of the public. Thus, although
public library books are available for public use, the library
staff will not be required to do research or make copies of
books for members of the public.

Interim Report to the 74th Legislature of the House State Affairs Comm.,
74th Leg., R.S., Subcommittee on Open Records Revisions 9 (1994) (emphasis
added). Therefore, section 552.027 excludes commercially available research
material from the definition of "public information."

You have submitted the User's Manual for the HEC-1 and HEC-2
Generalized Computer Program for our review. This submitted information appears
to be non-responsive to the request. The requestors ask for specific models for White
Oak Bayou and other specified properties. Thus, it appears that the requestors
are asking for the actual, resulting models developed for these properties once the
physical data are inputted into the computer models. You have neither submitted the
output models nor would section 552.027 apply to the output models as they are not
commercially available. Thus, you must release the requested models for the
specified properties.

As for the topographic map, you inform us that it is "available for a fee
from the United States Geological Survey (USGS)." Assuming that the map
was acquired by the county for research purposes, the map falls within the purview
of section 552.027(a). However, we note that section 552.027(c) may require
inspection of the requested topographical map if the information is made part of or
incorporated into the county's policy-making function.

We are resolving this matter with an informal letter ruling rather than with a
published open records decision. This ruling is limited to the particular records at
issue under the facts presented to us in this request and should not be relied upon as
a previous determination regarding any other records. If you have questions about
this ruling, please contact our office.